Virbhadra want to catch the bull by the horn, seek early trial

Shimla: Newly-appointed Himachal Congress chief Virbhadra Singh, who recently quit as Union Minister after a Shimla court allowed framing of charges against him in a corruption case, is set to move the High Court seeking an early trial which should end within three months.

“I am now myself moving the High Court as I want to face the trial. I will be requesting the Court that I want to face the trial and my only request would be that it should be continuous and octogenarian witnesses in the case should be examined first,” Singh said.

He said he will be requesting the court with a plea that the trial should be concluded within another two-three months and claimed that the case against him was “fabricated”.

“I know it does not suit the state government. They want to prolong it as long as possible. But, heart-to-heart they also know what the end result is going to be,” he said.

Charging the BJP government led by Prem Kumar Dhumal in poll-bound Himachal Pradesh with “fabricating” charges against him, he said, “This case against me is totally baseless.” Faced with fresh responsibilities of uniting the party ahead of the assembly elections in the state later this year, the five-time Chief Minister said, “I want to catch the bull by the horn and expose the nefarious designs of Prem Kumar Dhumal and his collaborators in the Himachal bureaucracy and elsewhere.”

“This is not the first time he has done so. When he was Chief minister last time, he had also fabricated such charges when he framed a case against me in the Sagar Katha case where I was acquitted and subsequent appeals were dismissed by the Court,” Singh said.